I know I'm in South Kroea when....

No pictures yet, but just wanted to start a list of things that make me know I'm in Korea:

1) Every morning when I get to school I put my shoes in a little locker with my name on it, and take out the slippers I will wear for the whole day.

2) When teaching....(that gets me every time)

3) A little lead in for this one. The students sit in a rectangle at nice new desks. 6 per table.
I often lean my arms on the desk and lean in to hear what the students are saying. With the grade 3/4's I will sometimes feel someone softly brushing the hair on my arms (my sleeves are often roled up). I try not to be startled, but it is a little one who is absolutely amazed that I have hair on my arms and has to touch it.

4) On the bus, or everywhere else, grade 7-8 and older boys are playing with each others hair, putting their heads on their friends shoulder....those kids are great. Very sensitive and very affectionate.....at times....they'll also turn and just punch each other in the arm really hard...

5) Girls/women walk around holding hands.....more so than actual couples.

6) Seeing scooters and/or cars slowing down at intersection when light is red....only to proceed through the red light while looking around and honking.

7) Every meal has red peppers in it....and kimchi (Cabbage with red peppers)

8) Before hopping into the shower, or doing dishes, we need to turn on the water heater. After we are done...we turn it off. Honestly takes about 5-7 minutes for the water to get really hot.

9) Do not bring your lunch to school. Everyone eats from cafeteria (all kids, principal, teachers....except Ellen....kidding...many foreign teacher bring lunches to school as food can be spicy and quite fishy....and staple of lunch is a good heap of rice. Break out the prune juice...haha.

10) When walking down the streets you'll get hit with a god awful smell. It comes from the garbage on the streets (they don't flush down the toilet paper, it gets put in the garbage) really gets the stench going. Some call it: "walking into the wall of ass". I like to think of it as: "Getting slapped in the face with a dirty diaper".

11) Mar. 4th 2009 - New co-teacher Mrs. O at lunch in the cafeteria. They love their food and everything that revolves around it. We are eating sea-weed soup and she tells me that after having a baby it is important to eat sea-weed. I answer that it must due to the iron content. She kinda accepts that with saying because of loss of blood. Great. She then tells me that it is good luck to eat the soup for breakfast on the day of your birthday. She then rambles on that if you have a test you should NOT eat the soup as it is bad luck. So I asked her: What do you do if you have a test on your birthday? She looked extremely stumped and could not answer me. She refused to choose. I pushed and asked what is more important, the test or the birthday. She laughed as that is the reaction when stumped and still did not answer.

12) Co-teach when comparing volleyball to ping-pong: "Some Korean women don't like playing with big balls."

Well....I'm sure this list will get larger and larger....just a couple things each day that I know I'm in Korea when.....